Strasbourg

On Nov 21, we visited Strasbourg, France.  Our ship docked on the east side of the Rhine, in Kehl, Germany, and we walked to a bus that drove us over the bridge into Strasbourg.  There we did a short bus tour past some EU buildings, and then got off for a walking tour and a few hours of free time.

We started out in the Petite France district of the old town, which is on an island formed by the splitting of the Ill River.

We gradually made our way to the cathedral.  It's breathtaking, although it's hard to get a good picture of it as the town closes in on it from all sides.  Here we approach from a side street:

Inside there is a famous astronomical clock from 1843 (there had been earlier versions going back to the 14th century).  It has a perpetual calendar, phases of the moon, indicates solar and lunar eclipses, and other interesting features:

After the cathedral, we had a few hours to walk around the old town:

Many stores were decorated very nicely for Christmas:

Ed and I visited the local history museum, where they had a model of the city representing the 1600's or so?  I can't remember exactly which century, but it shows how it looked when it was a fortified city:

The Rhine river followed different channels at that time, and they were well depicted in the model:

One of the branches of the river we saw after the museum:

The morning was overcast, but the sun came out weakly later in the afternoon and we got some better photos of the cathedral as we waited for the guide to walk us to a bus pick-up zone (due to the narrow streets, tour buses can't go into the centre of the town).

We loved Strasbourg, I think it was my favourite city that we visited during the cruise.  It's a shame we were only there for one day, there was lots more that could have been explored.